


Contagion

by Belle86



Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse, Barebacking, F/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Porn With Plot, Rough Sex, Wall Sex, Zombie Apocalypse, Zombie Apocalypse Appropriate Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-02
Updated: 2017-08-21
Packaged: 2018-04-29 20:12:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,228
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5141039
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Belle86/pseuds/Belle86
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A series of mostly porny, somewhat plotty Herc/Mako vignettes set during the zombie apocalypse.</p><p>Shit gets violent, shit gets sad, shit gets sexually explicit.</p><p>Tags to be updated as we go along.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Gymnasium

This was supposed to be an easy run. 

They’d cleared most of the school already, this was just to get a final count of how many rooms were usable for living space, what walls needed repair, how much scrap metal they’d need to find to repair the chain-link fence that surrounded it.

Twenty-six people crammed into the farmhouse they currently occupied was not a situation that would maintain for much longer. Lack of space and privacy was leading to sniping and petty arguments that escalated easily, the property was exposed to the elements, the dead, and passerby alike. They had to make a move, and soon.

The school would work. Could work. Had to work.

She and Herc had been tag-teaming the recon with Herc’s son, Chuck, and the Beckets, Raleigh and Yancy; two brothers who’d stumbled upon their group a few weeks ago. Chuck and Raleigh had been at each other’s throats since the beginning, but recently the trio had become inseparable.

Mako was certain they were all sleeping together in one configuration or another. Not that she cared, they all seemed happy. Plus, Chuck being occupied gave her and Herc more opportunities to slip away into the surrounding wood. 

Specifically to the treehouse they’d found near another house about a half mile away. The house had caught fire at some point and was completely uninhabitable, but the treehouse made for what could almost pass as a post-apocalyptic pied-a-terre for them to be alone for maybe an hour, before anyone could notice they were missing.

She’d miss it if their group made the move to the school. But if the move was successful, that would mean they’d have their own room, a luxury that she could only dream about at night when they both turned in in the room they shared with six other people; where Herc slept on a worn, single-sized mattress on the floor while Mako occupied the couch next to it that was too short for him. Mako letting her hand drop down in front to tangle her fingers with his was the extent of their nighttime cuddling.

A little over a year since the contagion had broken out and killed an estimated 60 percent of the Earth’s population, turning another 30 percent into flesh-hungry, dead-but-not-dead monsters. Gone were her dreams of heading up her own robotics engineering firm. Now all Mako Mori dreamed about was spooning with her boyfriend at night and being able to roll over and lazily kiss his rough, dark red stubble in the morning.

So here they were, on a final recon mission that would make that dream a reality.

But they’d been pinned down in the gym. Three dozen dead, maybe more, had spilled from a locker room that they thought had been cleared. Sudden and unrelenting, it had caught them both off guard and sent them scrambling for their weapons.

They’d gotten separated in the ensuing melee, Mako isn’t sure how, but how doesn’t matter. 

What matters is that she’s on one side of the gymnasium and Herc is on the other, still with at least a half dozen rotting, biting, poisonous _things_ between them.

She dispatches the corpse in front of her quickly, the blade of her sword slicing through its rot like an overripe peach. As she swings Gipsy’s weight with practiced ease, the two behind her drop, their skulls halved by the gleaming steel.

_“Mako!”_

She spins back around at the shout, her feet moving towards it without a thought.

He has to be in trouble if he’s actively calling for her.

Her eyes catch up with the rest of her body as she spots him, backed towards the maybe three-foot wide space between the bleachers and the wall, holding two biters at bay with his bare hands, their arms swinging wildly towards him, clawing and scratching at his jacket to get to him. 

His boots are slipping in the slick of blood and gore at his feet, unable to get enough footing or leverage to properly shove the rotten creatures off of him. His hunting knife is lodged in the skull of one he’d killed, on the ground, too far for him to grab, and with both hands occupied, he can’t go for the gun holstered at his side.

She runs, fast as she can, legs pumping, swinging at the last straggling biter as she passes it. Up the first few rows of bleachers and then straight towards Herc, her heavy boots clanging loud on the wood and metal.

The sound of her approach does nothing to deter the dead, they can smell him, smell live flesh, smell their next meal. She won’t allow it. Can’t allow it. They can’t have him, too.

With a shouted curse, she thrusts Gipsy’s blade forward, catching the closest one in the temple and stabbing straight through into the other. They still instantly and drop to the floor, she lets the sword go with them, their bodies crumpling to the ground in a sick, wet heap.

The air is nothing but ringing silence and panting breath for what feels like an eternity before her focus turns to Herc.

“Did they get you?” She tries to sound calm, doesn’t quite make it, “did they scratch you?”

“Mako--”

“Show me!” She grabs at his jacket, pushing it off and tossing it to the bleachers. “Let me see.”

“Mako, I’m fine.” He actually does manage to sound calm, but Mako frantically searches his arms, his face, his throat for any sign of damage. Pushes the sleeves of his worn white henley further up past his elbows, running her palms back and forth over his hands and forearms.

Nothing.

No scratches, no blood, no claw marks. Nothing but tanned skin and freckles.

She looks up at him, satisfied that he’s ok, to find him grinning down at her.

“Told you I was fine,” he says, “just needed an assist.”

Mako glares at him and turns to pull Gipsy’s blade from the decaying skulls she’d lodged it into. Hears Herc chuckle behind her and looks over her shoulder, up at him.

She gives up trying to dislodge the sword and fixes him with the most annoyed look she can summon, hands on her hips. “Is something funny?”

Herc shrugs, yanking his hunting knife free and wiping the blade off on the tattered clothing of the dead one at his feet. “You’re just cute when you’re mad at me, that’s all.”

“Cute? I’m when I’m worried you almost got yourself killed?”

He sheathes the knife back in the leather sleeve strapped to his thigh, leaning towards her, still bent at the waist. “Downright irresistible.”

Mako grabs his shirt collar and hauls him up close, intent on giving him a proper telling-to for worrying her, for being so cavalier with his very life. He doesn’t resist, though. Doesn’t resist, but instead, looks up at her with that same flash of ego, of an ever-present lust for a thrill; the same look she’d seen in his eye when he’d tossed a flare gun to his son, their entire hunting group pinned down by a horde, and shouted to all of them to _get down, we’re about to do something really stupid._

She kisses him instead. Kisses him hard and deep, putting more bite into it than normal; that can be his punishment. 

He returns the heat in the kiss, pulling her against him by her hips and stumbling them both to the wall, only a few steps away. Presses her against the wall, her back to the cool, painted concrete and hums against her lips. 

“Still mad at me?” He captures her mouth again, hungry and fiery and devouring.

She’s breathless when he breaks the kiss, “a little.”

Tugging at the fastenings on her pants, he rubs a stubbled cheek against hers and drops his voice just that half an octave lower that really isn’t fair, because they both know how incapable she is of resisting it. “Well let’s see what I can do about that.”

Her pants undone, he pushes them down quickly past her knees to bunch around the tops of her boots. There’s almost never enough time for them to be completely removed, anyway. She makes quick work of his own trousers as he shoves one hand up under her tank to grope her breast, nice and rough, the way she likes, and presses the other against the worn cotton panties still covering her sex.

She’s wet already, like even her cunt knows just how little time they have, hot against his hand. She grinds her hips into his touch and whines when he assaults her neck with his lips and tongue and teeth.

His cock is thick and hard and heavy when she pulls it free. His groan against her neck when she pumps him hard feels like victory. She turns and nips at the reddened tip of is ear, “come on, baby.”

Her panties join her trousers around her ankles in a flash.

Herc spits twice onto his fingertips, rubs it into and around her folds before hoisting her up, pressed between the wall and his firm chest, the soles of her boots pushed up flat against the wall and her knees bracketing his hips. Lines up and pushes into her, his cock spreading her open and filling her up, that delicious stretch that never fails to set her blood on fire.

She whimpers, high and breathy, as he drills into her quick and shallow until he’s in, fully in, pressed into her to the hilt. That perfect burst of heat and pressure that pushes up through her guts makes her dig her nails into his shoulders and moan, she moans so fucking loud and long, bucks her hips against his.

They quickly find their rhythm. Rolling but hard thrusts not designed to draw out the experience but get them both to the finish line quickly, as much of their love-making was, currently. Limited time, limited space, and limited privacy and safety had honed both of their abilities to get each other off in a hurry.

Up against the wall in a gymnasium full of the living dead was no exception.

Still, she wouldn’t trade this for anything. Wouldn’t trade the way he looks at her, the way he kisses her, the way he fucks her, for a goddamn thing.

Something rustles behind them and Mako looks up through hooded eyes. 

A dead one, the one she’d blindly swiped at with her sword. Staggering up and towards them, she hadn’t gotten it cleanly enough.

She moves one hand down from Herc’s shoulder to pull his pistol from his side harness, the one with the silencer. Cocks it, aims it over his shoulder at the rotter shambling toward them. Grips her other hand into the short hairs at the back of his neck. It’s not as short as he kept at the beginning of the outbreak, the coarse strands curl over her fingers.

“Hold still,” she breathes.

He does. But not before pushing up into her as far as he can, forcing the air from her lungs in a hoarse squeak, his face buried into her neck, against her skin, his stubble rough, his breath hot and damp.

Still, she holds the gun steady, takes her aim, pulls the trigger.

Putrid, dark blood bursts from between the fucker’s eyes as it jerks and drops to the ground.

“Got it.”

He turns his face up to place a hard, wet kiss against her jaw, “that’s my girl.”

Mako doesn’t know what it matters anymore, to have someone, to belong to someone. With death a heartbeat away for both of them, what could it possibly mean in the end?

She tightens the hand curled into his hair and pulls his head back to kiss him, deep and biting and rough. Maybe being somebody’s girl doesn’t mean fuck-all anymore, but being his girl means the world to her.

Herc picks the pace back up, quicker this time. Stays deep inside her. His hands dig into her thighs and ass as he lifts her up a bit to drop her back down onto his cock, fast, using her own weight to send jolts of pleasure through her over and over again.

Mako braces an arm around his shoulders and pulls the other down to rub furiously at her clit. She’s close, so close, just needs that little push. The whole world narrows down to the hot, wet grind of his cock inside her as she turns her head to the side and that hot, exquisite pressure coils tighter in her gut. When he sinks his teeth into the join at her neck and shoulder, sparks skitter down her spine like a lit fuse to a powder keg and that coil bursts. 

She comes hard, with loud, breathy moans, Herc following soon after as her walls clench and flutter around his cock, practically milking the liquid hot release from him that she feels coating in her insides.

Breath hot and mouths damp, the lingering moment as they catch their breaths is never long enough. Even with the deep, almost messy kiss full of soft and satisfied moans, she still always longs for more. To be able to relax into soft sheets, burrow into Herc’s chest and bask in that delicious, cottony post-coital haze.

Someday.

Until then, she’ll make do with being gently let back down to the ground ‘till she gets her feet back under her and stealing quick kisses while they both get their clothing mostly back in place.

Mako breaks the silence once her trousers and belt are somewhat refastened, “I was thinking about what we really should look for today.”

Herc raises an eyebrow at her, repositioning his shoulder holster.

“You were thinking about the mission?” He asks, “while I was fucking you? Sure know how to bolster a man’s ego there, Mori.”

“Blueprints,” she says.

He cocks his head slightly to the side and she continues, “blueprints of the school. It will be easier to track what areas have been cleared, what parts of the building need work, things like that.”

Hands on his hips, he mulls it over for a moment, “we can use them for room assignments, living quarters, storage.”

“Emergency exit routes, safety lockdown areas.”

“Perimeter patrols, lookout points.”

She smiles up at him, doing her level best not to look smug. “Blueprints.”

Herc pulls her in for a quick kiss and grins against her lips, “bloody brilliant girl.”

She secures Gipsy to her back, “ready?”

“Saw a set of stairs back this way,” he holds an arm out toward the door, “after you.”

“You just want to look at my ass on the way up,” she says, taking the lead anyway and raising an eyebrow at him as she goes past.

That smug smile she’d fought down before comes out in full when he slaps her ass in lieu of a reply.


	2. Chapter 2

They find the administrative offices on the third floor, only encountering three dead ones on the way.

Herc locks the door behind them once they’re in, after having made sure the rooms were clear of any danger, “well this brings back some bad memories.”

Mako looks up from the filing cabinet she’d been rifling through, “spent a lot of time in the headmaster’s office?”

“Enough.”

“Somehow, I am not surprised,” she says. Giving up on the filing cabinet, she turns her attention to the small coat closet behind the desk, where Herc is rooting around.

There’s a handful of cardboard tubes on the floor, one of them helpfully labeled “J. HALPERT SECONDARY SCHOOL - FINAL BLUEPRINT”.

“I think I won!” She calls out from the closet, and sticks the tube out behind her.

When she turns around, he’s sitting in the big leather chair at the desk, practically leering at her.

“Were you even looking?” She asks, already knowing the answer.

He takes the blueprints, winks at her, “oh I was lookin’.”

Mako swats him with the tube, then pulls out the papers to lay out across the desk. She plucks a red Sharpie from the pen-holder cup on the desk, starts making small ‘x’ notations over the areas of the school that they know have been cleared.

“We should do a final sweep with a full team,” she says, “before we bring everyone. That way if we run into anything like today, there shouldn’t be any casualties. We should fortify the outer corners to be look-out posts,” she says, circling the four best points on the blueprint, “set up a schedule for people to man them. We’ll have to have trainings, we should have enough people to cover three shifts on four posts, but we should also have circling patrols at the fence--”

He takes the marker from her hand, then gently grips her hand in his, “we’ll do what we have to do, Mako. All of us. And we’ll worry about shifts and training and all of that when we get there but look,” he smooths his free hand over the map of the school.

“This is ours, now. We can be safe here. Maybe build a life here. Forget about patrols and training for a minute; just look at this.”

She takes a quick breath, how can a patrol schedule not be of concern right now? But she closes her eyes and lets that breath out slowly, lets herself feel him stroking one big, broad hand up and down her back.

Opening her eyes, she smoothes her own free hand over the map, trails her fingertips over the back of his hand.

“So here’s where we’ll be living soon,” she muses.

The way he grins up at her doesn’t go unnoticed. 

“Think we’ll get first pick?” He asks.

“At what?”

“Rooms. You and me, think we’ll get first pick?”

She laughs, “you think Chuck will be ok with that?”

“Pretty sure Chuck is going to want to room with the Beckets.”

“Very true.”

He points to a classroom on the first floor, “how about this one? Corner, south-facing, probably lots of light.”

Mako leans forward and considers it, “not too close to the main entrance, cuts down on noise; if we have night patrols they probably won’t go past it too often. And look, it has closets.”

“So, so far we’ve got: southern exposure, quiet location, closet space,” he tightens his arm around her waist and rocks the chair slightly, “if it has granite countertops and an open floor plan we should sign the papers today.”

“No way our place wouldn’t have granite countertops,” she says, a little wistful.

He kisses her neck and settles in close, his ever-present scruff a delicious scratch against the join of her neck and shoulder. “Big wood-burning fireplace, maybe another one in the bedroom.”

“Wine fridge in the kitchen.”

Somehow, sometime, this had become a tradition of theirs, out on runs or on overnight watch. Describing, in long, rambling detail, wonderful dates and holidays and lover’s fantasies that took place in a world that didn’t exist anymore.

In an abandoned barn, with the stars glittering through the roof slats, Herc had told her about their first date: a hole-in-the-wall French restaurant that only took cash and none of the waitstaff spoke English(or at least admitted it). Neither of them really knew what they’d been served, but delicious didn’t even begin to describe that meal; they’d closed the place, to boot, and made out in the cab the entire way back to Herc’s place.

Shivering together in the cabin of a rusted-out pickup truck, Mako had described their Valentine’s night, cuddled up on the plush carpeting of the ocean-view apartment she’d always dreamed of, surrounded by blankets and pillows and paper plates with the crusts of their peanut butter sandwiches. She’d never been one for cooking, and as much as she’d convinced herself that homemade gnocci would be a breeze, the only breeze had been the one from the kitchen window Herc had thrown open to help vent out the thick black smoke emanating from the stovetop.

“You know,” he tightens the arm around her waist, rubs the other up the inside of her thigh, “when we move into this place, I’m going to fuck you in this office every chance I get.”

“Oh, you are?”

“That’s right, pretty girl,” her ass flush against his lap, he undoes the fastenings on her pants, slipping his hand inside and under her panties to gently play along her folds, still slick and sensitive from their romp in the gym.

“I’m gonna lay you out flat on this desk,” he says as she moans, her eyelids shuttering closed. What the hell, the door’s locked, “maybe I’ll bend you over it, give you a good spanking for being so naughty.”

His fingertips stroking up and around and against her clit reignite that fire in her guts.

“Such a bad girl, being sent to the headmaster’s office.”

She stiffens with a gasp as he finds the perfect pressure and the perfect angle, whimpers when he hones in on it, her orgasm starting to coil.

“Have you been a naughty girl, Mako?”

She nods quickly. Fuck, she’s so sensitive. “Nn-I--”

“Say it for me baby, come on, you know you want to.”

“nau-- naught-mmmmm, ah, fuck, I’m,” her eyes scrunch shut and her mouth goes dry, “ _imyournaughtygi--_ \--” her breath catches on the words. She knows he’s watching her, and part of her wants to duck and hide from his gaze, but the rest of her is proud, wanton, exhilarated.

His teeth scrape along the shell of her ear, and all it takes is a low, throaty, _“well then come for me, naughty girl,”_ and she’s gone, pure white behind her squeezed-shut eyes, shivering and panting through her orgasm.

As her climax and moans fade, his fingers slow, eventually slipping back up and out of her pants. She doesn’t miss how he quickly, and none-too-quietly sucks her taste off of them as she settles back into his chest, snuggling in the best she can. They’re quiet for a few moments, enjoying a rare moment without the constant moans of the dead.

“We should probably pack up these blueprints and head back to camp,” he says, not moving his hands from her waist. “At some point.”

She twists slightly in his lap and fixes him with as stern a look as she can manage, “you aren’t going to feel me up in the truck on the way back, are you?”

“I make no promises, Miss Mori.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Holy fuck has it been a long time since I've updated, or been here, or whatever.
> 
> Life is nuts, the world is burning down around our ears, huge apologies to everyone I owe comments and kudos and emails to, you know who you are - I'll do my best to get those done soon!
> 
> In the meantime, here's, I dunno, this.

“Do we want the bed closer to the windows for the breeze, or against the back wall to be out of the sun?” Herc asks from the middle of the classroom they’ve chosen. 

The school is finally cleared and ready to move in. The farmhouse has been stripped of supplies and furniture and pretty much anything not bolted down, all of which have been transported to the school over the past couple of weeks.

As promised, Mako and Herc got first pick of rooms. First floor corner with lots of light and an extra closet, just like she wanted. If not for the hordes of the undead outside the fences, it would be an occasion worthy of champagne and a big dinner party. But at this point, she’ll take what she can get.

Herc’s holding up one side of the stack of two mattresses, the other held up by Adam, a nice, quiet, sometimes too-quiet young man about Raleigh’s age who joined their group a few weeks back. He’s taken a liking to Mako, and she’s done her best to take him under her wing.

“Hmmm,” she sets her backpack down on the cleared-off teacher’s desk and considers the room for a moment. “Out of the sun.”

Herc nods to the Adam and they side-step over to the back corner of the room, setting it down with enough room on the wall side for whoever sleeps there to move in and out without disturbing the other person.

“What else do you need a hand with?” Adam asks, looking at Mako, wiping his hands together. 

Mako shrugs, “I think we’re alright. Thank you for helping, Adam.”

“You sure? I mean I can hang out for a bit of you need--”

“Really, Adam, we’re good.” She doesn’t mean to cut him off but she knows he’ll just hang around for ages like a lost puppy if given the chance, and she just doesn’t have the energy right now.

The young man nods quickly and gives an awkward half-wave to her as he leaves, “any time!”

Herc watches him go, an odd look on his face.

“What?” Mako asks.

“What, what?”

“What are you looking at him like that for?”

Herc gives the door a long last look, narrowing his eyes slightly, then looks over at Mako. “Can’t get a read on that boy,” he says, shrugging, “can’t figure out if he wants to be me or fuck me.”

She laughs. “Well I couldn’t blame him either way. I think he doesn’t feel like he has a place here, maybe he’s just trying to find a way to fit in.”

“Maybe he’s in love with you.”

“Maybe you’re projecting.”

“Hhmph,” he grunts, glaring at the door.

“Jealousy does not become you, Hercules,” she teases, “look, he’s nice and knows how to plant a few crops, why don’t we leave it at that?”

He doesn’t take his eyes off of the door, but makes a noise in agreement anyway.

The bed in place and the two of them alone again, she drops down on the worn mattress, leaning back, propped up on her hands. “Not a bad upgrade from the treehouse, hmm?”

He turns to her with a grin, “not bad at all.”

She watches him move about the classroom, moving and stacking things, making it as much into a living quarters as possible, and her mind wanders to how this all got started, the two of them.

They’d been out on a supply run. Simple, easy, and they worked well together already that it seemed like a no-brainer.

Chased off the main road by a hoard of dead, into the surrounding woods, they found an abandoned hunting cabin to hole up in for the night. While taking advantage of the nearby creek to refill their water bottles and hopefully find some berries and roughage, a storm had rolled in; quick and unexpected.

By the time they’d made it back to the cabin, the temperature had dropped from temperate to downright cold and they were drenched with rain water, soaked to the skin and chilled to the bone.

The cabin had no fireplace, only a wood-burning stove that didn’t give the appearance of being in working order. Neither one of them had any desire to risk dying of something as mundane as carbon monoxide poisoning. 

In the cabin was one, only one, cot. The floor was covered in dirt and dust and filth, so they’d opted to consolidate blankets and huddle together to warm back up while their clothes dried.

They’d each had their own blanket, and a shared thin quilt wrapped around them both. Stripped to their bare skin and pushed so close together, the mutual attraction they’d both been skirting around for weeks made itself blatantly, obviously clear. They ignored it for as long as possible, with small talk and verbal games of ‘I-Spy’, but the tension soon became palpable in the chilled damp.

Mako still isn’t sure who kissed who, but that’s how it started. Just a simple, almost chaste kiss, their necks straining towards each other in the darkness.

Then she was on top of him, both still with their blankets tucked around them. Her hands crept out to dig into his shoulders, the muscle there flexing back against her fingertips. She couldn’t help it, there he was, his hands, big and calloused and still cold from the rain, on her neck and in her hair and around her waist, his mouth working against hers, moaning ever so slightly against her lips. How could she resist?

She broke the kiss first, leaning back just enough to get her eyes to focus on his face, trying to get a read on him, his thoughts, his intentions. 

Not like any of that mattered now, really. She could go outside to take a piss in a bush and get scratched by a card-carrying member of the undead, and that would be it for her. She could catch a nasty cold and that, too, could be it. Death waited around every corner for all of them, at any time, now.

But it did matter to her. Mattered that she wouldn’t be a punchline back at base camp, wouldn’t be a bloozy story for him to tell his buddies, out on another run. End of the world or not, who she gave her body to still mattered to her.

In her twenty-some years on Earth, no one had ever looked at her the way that he had. Those crystal blue depths looking up at her, full of longing and lust and _offering_.

Bolstered by what she saw, she untucked her own blanket from where it had been tightly fastened around her shoulders, let it drop down, puddling around her waist. She arched her back, practically presenting herself, her flesh pebbling to gooseflesh in the cold, her nipples taught and hard.

“It’s cold, baby,” he said, his voice rough, as he’d gathered her blanket back up around her, pulling her close and pushing his own covering out of the way to press their bare chests together.

How long had it been since a man had called her _'baby'_ ? Since she’s heard real emotion behind it?

She trailed her fingertips down those thickly muscled arms. “You’ll just have to keep me warm, then.”

Even now, when there’s a cold draft through the farmhouse at night, or Herc’s out on a run or on patrol and she can’t even listen to the sound of his breathing, she goes back to that night in her mind. Goes back to those long hours of passion, deep and hungry kisses, whispered apologies for cold hands. Exhausted and sated, they’d fallen asleep in a heap of limbs and blankets, wedged together on the tiny cot.

Since then, she can count on one hand the number of times she’s fallen asleep in his arms.

Tonight, though. And tomorrow night, and the night after, and the night after that...

“So I think we have some time before dinner,” she says, leaning back on her elbows on the mattress.

He unholsters his pistol, a six-round shooter, gleaming silver even in the daylight.

“You know you look like a cowboy with that gun.”

He looks at it, gives it a spin before setting it down next to their newly-set bed. “Gets the job done. Don’t tell me you don’t love it.”

She meets his sly grin with her own, then tugs him closer by the finger she has in his collar.

“Oi, we need blankets and sheets and…. I dunno, pillows, I guess,” he protests, but even she can hear how half-hearted it is.

She pulls him down close, hitches her leg up over his hip and slides her arms over his shoulders and around his neck, “I think all we need is you and me.”


End file.
